Let's talk about belly dance

8 DVDs for Home Practice: Beginner to Advanced Belly Dance

Although they can never replace live instruction, practicing from home with DVDs can nicely compliment your study of Belly Dance. There are literally hundreds to choose from, so I put together a few of my favorites (Cabaret style) here:

BEGINNER

Instructional Bellydance with Jillina, Levels 1 -3

Jillina breaks down moves in a way that’s easy to understand and follow, putting them into combinations and finally a choreography. A good tool for building movement vocabulary, although there is less emphasis on practice and drills. My home study tip: use these DVDs to add more movements to your repertoire, but be sure to apply what you’ve learned to practice. Try to incorporate them while improvising to your favorite music.

Turkish Style Belly Dance with Artemis Mourat

If you’ve never taken a class with Artemis, you should! But if you can’t get down to Washington D.C., then this DVD is probably the next best thing. Artemis is a phenomenal dancer, instructor, and person. On this DVD she breaks down each move with several explanations that are great for different learning styles. With so few Turkish DVDs available, this is a real gem!

Bellydance Basics and Beyond: Technique for a Solid Foundation

Jenna has put together a fabulous tool in this DVD, from movements to combinations to choreography. Beginners will find a clear introduction to the dance with ‘room to grow’ as their technique improves. More advanced dancers will learn the finesse that comes with mastering movements and transitions. This is my top choice for new dancers, and at over 2.5 hours of content it’s quite the bargain!

INTERMEDIATE

Bellydance- The Next Level: Transitions, Turns, and Layers

Another wonderful DVD from Jenna and World Dance New York. If you liked the Bellydance Basics and Beyond, you’ll find the same easy to follow instruction and clear camera work that shows each movement from the front and the back. I especially like this DVD because it covers a subject that is, unfortunately, ignored too much in many classes: transitions! If you already have solid movement vocabulary, the instruction in this video will teach you how to weave everything together to create beautiful choreography and improvisational work, too.

Preparation, Drills, and Cool-down

This DVD comes from the 2003 winner of the Belly Dancer of the Universe Competition, Azhia. Designed as the “dancer’s companion”, the video leads the viewer through training exercises to increase strength and flexibility. Perhaps most valuable, Azhia demonstrates how familiar movements can be modified an infinite number of ways to add texture and variability to circles, eights, and shimmies. This is great choice for dancers who feel comfortable in their basic technique, but who are ready for an expanded approach to their study.

SPECIALTY

Flawless Floorwork: The Lost Art of Belly Dance Floorwork

This video is really wonderful in its scope and depth of the topic, providing much more than a nice breakdown and practice of the movements. There’s also a fitness section to help build the considerable amount of strength and flexibility required for floorwork, and a brief introduction to its history and place in the dance. Anyone who’s done it knows that the most frustrating part of moving around the floor is your costume always being in the way. Well, Ruby addresses that, too!

The Heartbeat of Bellydance: Rhythms and Bellydance Combinations for Drum Solos

This video by Jenna works as a great introduction to dancing to drum solos and live music. Viewers learn several movements and combinations, but also how to dance to the various drum rhythms in an improvisational setting. There’s three choreographies to learn, too, one each for beginner, intermediate, and advanced dancers. The introduction to Middle Eastern rhythms and musicality, an important component of any dancer’s study, is nicely done by Raquy.

Belly Dance with Veil

Sarah Skinner introduces veil turns, wraps, and traveling steps in this comprehensive DVD that also covers topics like selecting the right fabric. A great resource for beginner students, there are a few combinations or variations here that will interest intermediate or advanced dancers, as well. Certainly for all that it includes, this is a great value.

Will do — will probably put up a review once I get it and work with it. I agree with you on the Jenna vids and the Jillina set. I’d played around with the Jillina videos when I got them years ago, but didn’t really work with them in a disciplined way. Now that I’ve started doing so — they really repay it.